Children: Day Care

(asked on 24th March 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking to support childcare providers in supporting the families of key workers during the covid-19 outbreak.


Answered by
Vicky Ford Portrait
Vicky Ford
This question was answered on 23rd April 2020

The government has asked providers to continue to provide care for a limited number of children – those who are vulnerable and those whose parents are critical to the COVID-19 response and cannot be safely cared for at home. Providers should try to be as flexible as possible for critical workers who work shifts or atypical hours.

We urge all childcare providers to be reasonable and balanced in their dealings with parents, given the great uncertainty they will be facing too. That is one of the reasons why we announced on 17 March that we will continue to pay funding to local authorities for the early years entitlements for 2-, 3- and 4-year-olds and that funding would not be clawed back from local authorities during closures, or where children are withdrawn, because of COVID-19.

The government has already introduced a range of measures to support businesses and workers during this period. Further details of support available for early years providers can be found here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-early-years-and-childcare-closures/coronavirus-covid-19-early-years-and-childcare-closures#funding.

Reticulating Splines